Once 87 octane goes above $2.00 [It's about $1.80 right now] I'll probably see if I can get a carpool started. I have to drive an hour round trip each day and public transit is terrible around here. I might be able to ride a bus to work but I've no idea how reliable or how long it would take. I still remember a summer six or seven years ago when gas was around 89 cents a gallon for a few weeks. grr.
posted 13 years ago
by sciurus

southwestern Illinois has it at $1.68 a gallon for regular unleaded.
posted 13 years ago
by Fes

damn...our gas is sold in metric and i'm still on imperial measurements...so, let's see...
for the last week it has ranged from 77 to 79 cents per litre and so that would be about four dollars a gallon? for the cheapest grade.
far too much, anyway.
our city transit is a literal waste of time, due to long and circuitous routes.
so i drive and walk. i always have my dog with me, any way.
but if i drive twenty-five miles to the next town it is ten cents a litre cheaper!
posted 13 years ago
by dxlifer

as an aside, I wonder if a map that showed the price variation by location would yield interesting results. I've always wondered why gas was five to ten cents cheaper across the Mississippi River in Missouri than in Illinois, and the reasons why there is so much variation throughout the nation, especially for the same brands of gasoline (and branding in gasoline is not a prevalent consumer issue - you get gas whereever's closest, not from whom you perceive has the *best* gas). At first I thought it might be regular old vigorous capitalism at work, yet every time someone calls the gas industry on a gouge, they claim they're slaves to market forces beyond their control.
posted 13 years ago
by Fes

The major difference between countries is the amount of tax that the consumer pays as part of the pump price," said Carrie Pottinger Salama, an energy prices and taxes analyst with the International Energy Agency in Paris, a worldwide policy forum. According to Salama, as of the last quarter of 1999, the country with the lowest gasoline tax was Mexico at 13 percent and the highest was the United Kingdom at 79 percent. In the United States, the figure was 26 percent, which includes state and federal taxes.
SideDish, you're a wonder. Thanks!
posted 13 years ago
by Fes

Thanks, SideDish! Good information, it's a real eye-opener to see how varying the percentages are. Can any Mexico residents let us know what their current average is right now?
There are few instances where I would say "Thank God, I don't live in England!", but this would be one of those times.
posted 13 years ago
by Darshon

Just paid 1.81 for full serve at the pump, but that station is a rarity. Typically around here, it's 1.88 for self right now.
(In Upstate NY BTW)
posted 13 years ago
by Captain Psyko

fes - a big part of it has got to be differing state gas taxes (we southwest michigan people used to cross the border to buy cheap indiana gas, until they raised the state tax to equal michigan's). also supply and demand has a lot to do with it as well - the farther you are from a gas production plant, the more expensive it is to ship the gas to your location. thus higher prices at the pump to recoup the losses. and (let's be honest) the larger the city you are in, the more expensive it will be. that's got to be at least partly due to the higher price of property in the cities - it costs more to store it, and it gets used up faster so more must be shipped in regularly.
we're up around $1.80 or so for the 87 octane stuff in mid-michigan; i guess i don't mind so much (i'm a mile from work, car gets 30 mpg, don't take long trips that often). sure it sucks to pay the money, but soon as the weather gets warmer i'm looking forward to riding a bike in or walking at least some of the time (say, if it isn't raining or i don't have to carry too much stuff). and maybe gas prices going up will be good for other reasons.
like, say, vehicle size and feul economy. i can't help but wonder how popular the 10 mpg vehicles like the hummers and explorers and escalades would be if the US had the same pricing per unit of gas as the UK, etc. i imagine that we'd be pushing much harder for feul economy rather than sheer size. i wouldn't mind seeing fewer huge SUVs on the road (generally with only one person inside - in a vehicle that could double as a city bus...)
then again, quite a few of us here have some amazingly long commutes, compared to more settled regions of the world. higher gas prices might really screw with some people, making it not cost-effective to go to work at the current wages. at one point i was putting in 600 miles per week driving to work and back. no public transportation around here that i could have used in lieu of driving. if i had to pay more for gas i couldn't have worked that job; cost of living near my place of employment was out of my range, current rent + gas + car upkeep was still cheaper than moving.
'course us US residents are kind of spoiled by our open space, and by the impression that (at least around here, can't speak for big-city dwellers) everyone needs their own car.
posted 13 years ago
by caution live frogs

My SO is in sales and drives about 100 miles a day if he's out in his territory. After hearing about the gas price increases on the way, I suggested looking at hybrid cars. I was expecting resistance since he restores & drives classic old cars (read: crappy mileage), but he's actually agreed that's a good choice.
There aren't any good mass transit options in my town. Last week when I bought gas it was $1.69/gallon (US). I'm getting nervous. I'll be carpooling when it gets above $2/gallon.
posted 13 years ago
by Mickey

Gas is still too cheap. If people still take the car for driving to the shop around the corner, gas prices are too low. And we're paying a bit more over here in Canada than our southern neighbours. Here in Montréal a liter of low octane costs around CAD$0.84 which is around US$2.40 per gallon.
@caution live frogs: One of the reasons so many people in the US drive SUVs is because they are considered 'trucks', so they don't have to comply to emission laws for 'cars' and don't need catalytic converters (and Detroit likes that a lot). Another reason is they are tax deductible if you have a (small) business which can save you a lot of money.
SUVs comprise 43 percent (!) of the vehicles on the road today and if I was living in the US I would buy one too. You better have some mass whenever another SUV hits you. If you can't beat them, join them.
posted 13 years ago
by mare

the farther you are from a gas production plant, the more expensive it is to ship the gas to your location. thus higher prices at the pump to recoup the losses.
For some reason, that eminently logical theory doesn't work in California. The last time I was at the pump, (about 20 miles from the local refinery) I paid $2.19 a gallon (not for the premium stuff either.) I've seen it for as much as $2.69 a gallon recently.
Needless to say, I don't drive to work. I'm a prisoner to maddeningly inefficient public transit.
posted 13 years ago
by ambrosia

I live in LA and there is no arguing that the roads are just awful. Potholes everywhere (I have a mental swerve map of my neighborhood, which i call upon frequently), bad lights, poorly designed intersections, etc. I would be more than happy to pay an extra 10-20 cents per gallon if that tax went directly to road repair.
The money given to big brother would more than offset the money saved in wear and tear from not slamming into that unavoidable 6 inch pothole for the 27th time...
posted 13 years ago
by shotsy

I also live in LA and am more than willing to have gas go up to
$5-$6 dollars a gallon, at least until mid November ;-)
Keeps the SUV asswipes off the streets and will help get numb-nuts out of office.
posted 13 years ago
by squidranch

I usually pay $2.19, too, for the cheap stuff. It makes me wonder what kind of jobs those that drive Hummers and the like have.
ambrosia, are you in Northern Cali? Were you affected by that mass transit strike? That was awful! Only 25% of busses & light rail trains were running. So much for attempting to drive less...
shotsy, it's like that here, too. There's one road that I have to take on my way home, and it's always littered with couches, washing machines, and dead animals. The same potholes are always getting patched and re-appearing again. It's maddening, isn't it?
posted 13 years ago
by minda25

Yeah, it drives me crazy. It is strange that here in LA we care so much about our cars, but so little about the roads they drive on.
Additionally, I've gotta say that these new high gas prices have made me a healthier person. I walk places more not because I don't want to pay for gas, but just because thinking about gas prices has made me more conscious about how, and for what I use my car. It turns visits to the video store into 45 minute journeys, but walking there makes me appreciate my neighborhood more and get a bit of excercise.
posted 13 years ago
by shotsy

When I filled up last week I paid $1.69(US) on the other side of town (Albuquerque). At the stations nearest my home I can usually get fuel for about $1.61.
As for alternatives: our public transit system is horrid. Albuquerque is essentially laid out like a giant suburb outside of the areas around the university or downtown. I'll be buying a bicycle or riding my motorcycle more. I did however make an improvement when I traded in my gas-guzzling faux SUV this January. I <3 my Civic.
Mare: I wish the reasoning behind Americans loving their SUVs was as simple as you say. The tax break, emissions laws and safety concerns almost seem like valid reasons. In my experience it's entirely cosmetic.
posted 13 years ago
by IgnorantSlut

Here is a good conversation with Malcolm Gladwell about a recent article he wrote for the New Yorker about SUV safety. I couldn't find the article itself, but some of its points are contained in the interview.
The actual article was great, if you are interested in that sort of thing.
posted 13 years ago
by shotsy

Here in Montana we've been hovering between $1.60-$1.70 for a couple of months.
And we wouldn't trade our SUV, or my mid-size sedan, for anything. In fact, I'm on the verge of upgrading to a small SUV myself.
Gas prices don't faze me one bit -- as pointed out above, we pay far less for gas than other regions of the world, and considering the benefits that we derive from it, I have no problem paying higher prices. I won't necessarily *enjoy* it, but I won't bitch & whine about it.
And considering how relatively inexpensive gasoline is over the last two decades, I'm actually kind of baffled that anybody is complaining. When I first began driving (~1984), I remember paying between $0.99 and $1.30 per gallon...and over the course of 20 years, the price hasn't really gone up that much at all, compared to other goods/services.
Two cents. Stone me at will.
posted 13 years ago
by davidmsc

Two bucks a gallon in sw florida, but I'm about to head back to subway life again.
Thank god. Old people and young people can't drive.
posted 13 years ago
by forksclovetofu

Even though some people would argue that diesel is dirtier, I love my VW TDI. It gets 50mpg and I was able to drive from Boston, MA to Sandusky, OH on one tank. It makes me wonder how the emissions from diesel compare to large SUV's when you get that kind of mileage. I think I pay about $1.70 per gallon but I have not filled my car since the end of February ;).
posted 13 years ago
by CaptainSunshine

$2.21/gallon here, just outside San Diego, with no end in sight. The talking heads on the "news" are saying $3.00/gallon by the end of the year. What they're basing that on, they don't say. It's probably a self-fulfilling prophecy, though.
The really depressing parts are: 1) due to work hours, circumstances, and where I live, I can't do without at least a tank a week; and 2) my Subaru Forester is about the smallest vehicle I ever see on the freeways. And while we have a most excellent trolley system here in SD, it doesn't go near my work, though it's great for going downtown/eating out/clubbing/whatever.
If gas hits $3.00/gallon, I'll probably buy a VW Golf TDI (diesel, ~50 mpg) even if I have to go outside of California to buy it.
posted 13 years ago
by hicinbaby

$1.79/gallon in Minneapolis, and it should be much higher. Even if prices quadrupled it wouldn't change my habits much. My husband and I only have 1 car, it gets good mileage, we already carpool together or take the bus (not right now though: transit strike), and we hate long commutes so we live close to our jobs. If anything changed we'd probably walk more, but as Shotsy pointed out walking is good stuff.
Capt Sunshine, if it didn't get so effing cold here we'd probably have a diesel. When that fuel gels, my god what a pain in the ass.
posted 13 years ago
by shinything

From $1.65 in the boonies to $2.01 downtown Portland.
Although ours are a little different since we are legally prohibited from pumping our own gas and rely on "mini-serve".
posted 13 years ago
by Scott

Shiny Thing- I know my complaints about cold pale in comparison to your city, but the TDI does come with "glow plugs" to liquify the fuel so it starts. As a reference, I got it started with no problems when it was about 15 below one morning. The sucky thing is that it takes about five times as long for the interior of the car to get warm. Here's a link with more information.
posted 13 years ago
by CaptainSunshine

Say, IgnorantSlut, is your "economy" grade gas 86 octane (as opposed to 87 in other places I have been) in Albuquerque as it is in much of New Mexico? I have only noticed that in NM and wondered why they do it that way (though I must say I have not been enough places to know if that is uncommon).
I say: bring on the gas prices, if that is what the market requires.
posted 13 years ago
by jjray

If an SUV is a truck, why allow people to drive it on a car license? Make them head down to the DMV for a new endorsement, says I.
(I'd actually like to see this happen in New Zealand, where the biggest 4WDs would, fully laden, head into Class 2 territory. That way people who need 'em can have 'em, and shitty drivers who mask their insecurities with 'em can't).
Unleaded 91 is a little over $1/litre in Wellington, and 97 is something like $1.10.
I don't really care, since I generally walk or use my bike. There's something to be said for around 16km/l economy in town, and 20 out of it.
posted 13 years ago
by rodgerd

jjray: it's 86 here in Albuquerque. The octane is lower here in New Mexico because at our altitude engines don't require the same octane "boost" as at sea level.
And on preview rogerd: I'm right there with you. Back in Chicago trucks aren't allowed on Lake Shore Drive. If SUVs were required to have truck tags they wouldn't be allowed either. That is reason enough to drive a car, at least for me.
posted 13 years ago
by IgnorantSlut

I've just started thinking about this, the main question, in the last week or two. To get into the city from my house is $2 by bus with a free return transfer. It's around 8km into the city. It currently costs me around $60 to fill my tank (at $1.16/litre). I'm in the process of working out my cost per km for driving so I can decide whether to bus places more often or not.
The cost of petrol went up by a good four cents or so recently and when I asked the Petroleum Transfer Technician, he said it was related to the Spain bombing. It's supposed to go up by another cent per litre so the whole country can cover the cost of a motorway upgrade in Auckland (admittedly, some of this is presumably going to other parts of the country, but the further south you go in NZ, the more resentful people become of the North Island, especially Auckland).
If I'm not going far, I walk or bike (complete with 15-month-old passenger on the back), but I spend a lot of time on the opposite side of town from where I live.
rodgerd, there's a heck of a discrepancy between the cost of fuel in Wellington and Christchurch. I wonder why? ($1.15 for 91.)
posted 13 years ago
by tracicle

Also, if I don't do any long-distance travel, I can make a tank of petrol last a month. Go me!
posted 13 years ago
by tracicle

Possibly I didn't check correctly, but I know it costs more in the South Island every time I visit my parents.
posted 13 years ago
by rodgerd

Yesterday, I paid $1.70-something for cheap-grade of gas in Miami.
I was in San Diego at the beginning of the month... and saw gas prices between $2.01 and $2.28. Again, for the cheap stuff.
posted 13 years ago
by the_bone

California's prices are always more inflated than elsewhere -- I think when I was roadtripping about, the cheapest gas I found in the US was in Arizona, but I didn't go further east than the Four Corners. California has its own refineries and the gas that is sold there is refined there, whereas other states get their gas refined in one place. I think there's some difference in the refining process, too, but I don't remember the details.
I remember going to a beach in LA near where the offshore oil was piped in, or something similar, and stepping on little tarry deposits all over the sand.
posted 13 years ago
by tracicle

I believe California has higher standards for the cleanliness of petrol than many other states, which is part of the price difference.
Here in New Zealand, of course, Auckland gets special extra clean diesel, but the cost is levied across the whole country.
posted 13 years ago
by rodgerd

Sullivan, everyone knows the price of gas will go up in another two months anyway, guaranteed. It always increases right before summer holidays start, then drops back slightly at the end of summer.
/voice of experience, three point five years' worth
That said, it's a little pathetic that people care more about fuel prices than the war. Grr.
posted 13 years ago
by tracicle

Okay, here it is a year later and what are we paying now? As of today, in my neck of the woods, $2.50 per gallon for the cheap stuff.
And, yes, I know you Europeans have it much worse and feel no sympathy for us in the U.S.
So, how much is it across our fair nation?
posted 12 years ago
by Darshon

Petrol here in Christchurch is now around $1.25/litre, compared to the $1.15 it was in my comment above. The government has introduced another road tax which is incorporated into the cost of fuel. I think it's definitely more cost-effective to catch the bus now. I've definitely been walking more.
posted 12 years ago
by tracicle

Pittsburgh, PA. Around $2.50 a gallon here too. I've put my car on advertisement and hope to sell it within the month. The bicycle and buses take me everywhere I need to go, and I'm really too old to impressing babes with my ride in any case.
posted 12 years ago
by fuyugare

How much are you paying for sex?
About a dollar per litre.
posted 12 years ago
by Wolof

*is afraid to ask*
Per litre of what, Wolof?
posted 12 years ago
by Alnedra

they don't have to comply to emission laws for 'cars' and don't need catalytic converters (and Detroit likes that a lot)
SUV's have catalytic converters.
What they don't have to comply with, AFAIK, are the CAFE requirements that semi-force manufacturers to have an average fleet MPG of at least [foo], and that apply gas-guzzler taxes to, well, gas guzzlers.
I don't think that really figures in very much. It seems obvious to me that back in the dim mists of history, there were station wagons, and lo, station wagons were mom-mobiles and family trucksters and were uncool. But people grew up and popped out puppies left and right, and behold! They desired the room of a station wagon, but they did not want a station wagon, because that was what their mom drove. And Chrysler was wise, and Chrysler invented the minivan, which was not uncool because it was like a van, and the A-Team drove a van, and it was Not A Wagon. But, then, mom after mom drove the minivan, and it became unto them the Family Truckster, and yea I say unto you that it became Uncool. Then manufacturers cast about in the abyss, looking for something that was not a station wagon and not a minivan, and the Bronco and Blazer came forth and said unto them, "I am an SUV. I am not a station wagon or a minivan, but I can hold a pack of kids and their shit. Lo, my tires are large, implying that the genitalia of my driver are similarly large if not as wheel-like." And they sold the SUV, and it was good. Or at least profitable. And in the fullness of time, mom after mom shall taint the SUV with her mom-ness, and the SUV shall be the Family Truckster, and it shall be Lame and Uncool to drive one, and St. Ford shall figure out something else to fill the same market niche.
posted 12 years ago
by Xeny

'Gas' here in the UK costs about £0.86/litre, or 0.86*3.79=£3.26 per gallon, that is about 3.26*1.87 = just over 6 US dollars per gallon.
No, I don't have a car. But then I live in London, and it's a perfectly viable option to get by on public transport here (indeed any option is faster than driving within the city).
posted 12 years ago
by altolinguistic

had an interesting discussion with someone who believes our gas consumption is directly responsible for the war in Iraq.
I disagreed.
posted 12 years ago
by petebest

No way. My look of utter amazed bafflement trumped the opponent's haughty indignation.
Out of simple respect for not being kneed in the crotch, I avoided the ear-circling "you're nuts" motion.
posted 12 years ago
by petebest

$2.45 a gallon for 87 self-serve, 40 miles north of NYC.
posted 12 years ago
by mlis

$2.13 for 87 self serve in Houston. From downtown you can see where they make the stuff.
posted 12 years ago
by EarWax

$2.57/gallon for low-test (87) in San Francisco. At Arco, which is known for being a handful of cents/gallon cheaper than the competition.
Northern California just gets absolutely screwed on gas prices, for some reason. Sure, all of California is usually expensive, but in NorCal it's always 10 cents more expensive than in LA. And they refine the stuff just across the SF Bay from where I live, so it ain't about transportation costs.
And if I did pay for sex, I'd try to pay as much as possible, because I think you probably get what you pay for.
posted 12 years ago
by HawthorneWingo

not all petroleum distilled at the plant next door becomes automotive fuel. Airlines suck lotsa fuel, so the limited refinery capacity on the west coast has to be balanced with reduced automotive fuel/shipping product over the Rockies. Plus its more expensive to 'mine' the oil on the west coast, and that $$$ has to be passed on to someone. There are many additional reasons to as why that is as well.
The most important question you should be asking: are you really getting a gallon of gas when you pay for it?
posted 12 years ago
by blogRot

it is? How would I know? Is this a big scam everybody but me knows about?
posted 12 years ago
by petebest